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Jonathan Swift inscribed Modest Proposal with the perception to better humanity. It is a satirical pamphlet that scrutinizes the outlook of the rich towards the poor starving children in society. It was written in 1729 with the aim to prevent children of the deprived individuals in Ireland from being a burden on their country or parents and for turning them to be beneficial to the public. This proposal consisted of selling, skinning, and purchasing infants at the age of one. Such kind of proposal that he came up with is a very controversial and inhuman one when it comes to being socially accepted. He commences his writing by talking on walking down a street in Ireland. He asserts how someone would see “mendicants of the female sex, followed by three, four, or six kids, all in tatters, and plaguing each commuter for donations.” Jonathan Swift’s thinking behind this proposal is that many ladies were getting kids that they were not able to care for. Jonathan swift uses rhetorical devices of logos and ethos in order to get his message across and make his argument more effective.
Swift asserts that this suggestion would make the babies “advantageous to the public” (Swift 4). It also talks about the terrible situations in which the individuals were dwelling at the time. He blames the politicians for the disgraceful state of affairs as a result of the absence of apathy provided in the decision-making process in dealing with the conditions. In the proposal, he uses sarcasm, rhetorical exaggeration, and insincerity to show his annoyance with poverty-stricken citizens, politicians, and the papists of Ireland at the time. He uses several rhetorical devices effectively as he emphasizes his proposal. He uses humor, logical fallacies, repetition, parallelism, metaphors, in addition to satire and sarcasm to highlight the negative attitudes. He starts by blaming and mocking the kids’ mothers by saying to them that they ought to engage or find themselves working to receive an honest living rather than ambling to beg for alms (Swift, 5). He also forecasts coming hard days for these youngsters that when they mature up, they will become thieves. This is mere because the paternities did not teach them the modest way of life.
When he wrote the Modest Proposal, he attempted to get his audience to perceive the problem by taking it and giving inhumane and unethical solutions using rhetorical devices to bring out individuals’ emotions. One of the devices he used that brings emotions is using constant metaphor whereby he compares children or labels them as bodies of carcasses or stocks. Swift employs the use of logos to assist him throughout his proposal. He makes a very persuasive and logical argument that the Irish should eat their children. Swift makes a situation that by feeding on the deprived babies after they attain one year of age, the nation would be dealing with many significant problems the nation is facing. He asserts that by feeding on the infants, they can reduce the number of kids that the low-income families have to support, the males would not beat their expectant spouses since the infants they are carrying are valuable like a calf or a foal, and by vending the babies as foodstuff, the economy will be enhanced.
Jonathan Swift uses logical fallacies to make his argument in his writing. His thinking and way of argument lacks validity and appear incorrect in what is proposing. It is evident in his booklet on lines 69 to 73. He noted that a young, healthy kid is an enjoyable foodstuff to be roasted, stewed, and boiled to be served and consumed. Besides, he has figured out a large number of children to be reserved for breeding. This dehumanizes the kids to be like animals. He uses emotional plea in his dispute by recommending slaughterhouses to be constructed in appropriate locations and butchers to be put to perform the work of slaughtering the children. He additionally overstresses by asserting that the youngsters will be roasted like pigs. Swift captures his readers’ emotions because no parent will accept his child to be done like this. An additional rhetorical device that he uses in his work is irony. Swift asserts, ‘I estimate there might be approximately two hundred thousand couple whose partners are breeders’ and ‘how this figure shall be raised and provided for.’ (Albert, 10) This proposal is ironic since he equates women to animals. Furthermore, this makes a good argument since human beings do not breed and cannot be reared. Jonathan Swift dehumanizes humankind and makes satire in his account.
Jonathan swift, in his structure of backing up his dispute, he is sarcastic in a way that particular body parts of infants are right to take. He additionally elucidates that in certain circumstances, the parts of the body will be on-demand. He further asserts that healthy and good children will be skinned and be used to make admirable summer boots for men and gloves for women. This perception is ridiculous to a level that kids will be considered food, and their body parts will be used to make ornaments. Jonathan makes fun of children that they will be sold for 10 shillings, whereby their mothers will get an eight shillings profit to use until they are able to give birth to another child.
In conclusion, Jonathan puts into practice a number of rhetorical devices as he highlights his writing. He uses repetition, parallelism, logical fallacies, metaphors, in addition to sarcasm and satire. The Modest Proposal was an effort to convince an Irish Parliament to improve the condition of the poor. The idea of eating children was used as a metaphor since he perceived it as exploiting the poor.
Works Cited
Swift, Jonathan. Irish Political Writings after 1725: A Modest Proposal and Other Works. Cambridge University Press (CUP), 2018.
Power, Albert. “Jonathan Swift (1667-1745).” The Green Book: Writings on Irish Gothic, Supernatural and Fantastic Literature 12 (2018): 9-16.
Jermaine Byrant
Nicole Johnson
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